Eighteen
by Annabrea-Shaw
Summary: Maybe, though, he'd stop sleeping with the girls around camp. At least until they started turning eighteen. :: A story based on an idea that has been running through my head for a long time. Chapters will be short, but hopefully there will be many.
1. Chapter 1

**AN - Hey y'all. I just got in to The 100, and binged all of season 1 on Netflix, plus the first three episodes of season 2 on Hulu, over the weekend. I keep thinking, though, that Bellamy has got to be at least four years older than Octavia, more likely six or seven, which would make him somewhere between the ages of 21 and 25. I dunno why, but something about him being the only adult in a camp full of teenagers gets my attention, but I have hardly seen anyone address that on ffnet, so I wanted to draw some attention to it.**

**Please review. I'm always looking for helpful hints to write better, and ideas to keep a story moving. I have a few short chapters written up, that I'll try to space out every day or two this week, then we'll see where it goes.**

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><p>He was doing it again. Bellamy, he was making eyes at that girl, Jazz. Actually, Clarke relented, he was just returning the girls eye-making, meeting her shy, longing looks with his own cocky, smoldering ones. But whether making or returning, Clarke was of the very firm opinion that Bellamy should not have been doing either, especially when he was supposed to be helping her with the patrol assignments for the next week. Just because there hadn't been any threat from the Grounders since their release of Anya, didn't mean there wasn't any danger outside their walls.<p>

"Stop that." She said to him, reaching over to nudge him in the knee with her boot. Bellamy turned to look at her, eyebrow raised in question. "That." Clarke gestured vaguely between him and the direction of Jazz. "Encouraging her. You can't encourage her, Bellamy, she's _sixteen_."

"A lot of girls here are sixteen, Princess." He said, one eyebrow quirked. The unspoken message was that Roma had been sixteen, and Teya, and both of them had graced his bed without any complaint from her. Clarke rolled her eyes across the rough wooden table.

"Yeah, but Jazz isn't like some of the other girls here. She's more…."

The older boy – man, really – smirked rougishly. "Virginal?" He suggested.

"Innocent." Clarke deadpanned with a disapproving look. "And naïve. She doesn't understand that you're not like that, that being with you wouldn't mean actually _being_with you, on a permanent basis."

"Clarke – "

"No, Bellamy! You said it yourself; a lot of girls here are sixteen. Everyone in this camp, except you, is a teenager. You're twenty three, that's _seven years_ older than sixteen, but a lot of people here seem to forget that. I get that you have needs, or whatever, but please remember that not everyone has as much… experience in this area as you do."

Bellamy considered her with his head tilted forward and eyebrows raised, suggestive smirk still on his face. Then he rolled his own eyes, shrugging back into a slouch and taking a large bite out of his apple. "Alright, Princess, relax. I'm not into virgins anyways."

The way he said it implied that he was talking about more than sixteen year old Jazz, but Clarke refused to rise to the bait. If Bellamy wanted to believe that she was a virgin, and hold it over her, then fine. She wasn't going to correct him. "Good." She said, "Because we can't have anyone distracted if we're going to rebuild this place before winter."

They turned their attention back to the task at hand, Bellamy, thankfully, now fully focused on the patrol assignments. Since the new peace with the Grounders, though still tentative and untested, was established, he'd been more comfortable assigning new, less experienced guards to patrol, provided they worked under the supervision of one of his guys. After some back and forth, and a lot of convincing on Clarke's end, they decided that Craig, a fifteen year old from Agro-station, would be paired with Miller for the first night shift. Schedule settled, they broke for the afternoon, separating to oversee their own sections of the rebuild effort.

Later, while comparing notes with James-the-Engineer on the new wall, Bellamy saw Jazz shift into his line of sight. Without hesitating he turned his eyes away, letting them fall instead on the dropship, where he knew Clarke was reorganizing the layout of her ground-level med bay.


	2. Chapter 2

**AN - Not sure if I like this one. I wasn't going to post it at all, but I didn't like the next one very much either and I'm still rewriting it. But, since I promised to try for every day or every other day, here you go.**

**Also, I love the reviews. Tons. Please don't be offended if I don't reply to your review, though. The reply-to-review feature is relatively new to me (when I started on ffnet you had to write replies in the chapter, and that took a while), and I haven't really gotten used to it. But! Please keep reviewing, and if anyone has any ideas they want to see in this story, let me know, I love writing to prompts.**

**Let me know what you think of this one, if the response is bad then I'll probably replace it with the (much better) next one.**

**Much Love! - Me**

**(Belated Disclaimer: I don't own The 100, neither the book by Kass Morgan or the CW TV show)**

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><p>That night Bellamy went to bed alone, despite the suggestive looks he saw Teya sending him all afternoon. He didn't want to admit it, but he was still thinking about what Clarke had said – that everyone else in camp was a teenager.<p>

It was something Bellamy knew, of course, when he'd snuck onto the dropship with the 100. They were the Ark prisoners, and all Ark prisoners were minors, which meant that every member of the 100 was under age eighteen. He just hadn't really thought about it before, and with the power trip he'd jumped on upon their arrival, so different from his life as a janitor, Bellamy had relished in the attention.

Now that he did think about it, though, it was kind of weird. He, a grown ass man, stuck on a planet with ninety something twelve to seventeen year olds, and his only thought (after Octavia and being in charge) was to get laid by girls the same age as his little sister? Bellamy was sure that if there had been any other man in his place, he'd have killed him.

Unbidden to him, Bellamy's mind turned to the girl's he'd been with since the landing. He knew Roma and Teya were sixteen, because Teya had said so the night they buried Roni, but he wasn't sure about the others. He thought that Monica was probably seventeen, but that was just a guess. He found himself wondering how old Raven was. The girl wasn't one of the original 100, and she was a mechanic back on the Ark, which suggested that she was a legal adult. But she was dating the Spacewalker, who _was _one of the 100 and under eighteen, and the boy had mentioned her status as the youngest zeroG mechanic in fifty years.

Bellamy didn't know how old the last 'youngest mechanic' had been, having had very little interest in history after the war that had launched the Ark.

If Finn was seventeen, almost eighteen, then maybe Raven was barely eighteen. That would explain the relationship between the two as well as Raven's job. Maybe he could figure out how old Finn was. Clarke would probably know, since she and Finn were friends. For a while there, he'd even thought the Clarke saw Spacewaker as more than friends. How old was Clarke anyways?

Bellamy pictured his co-leader in his mind, remembering all the times he'd seen her make the difficult decisions required of them. She'd killed Atom when he couldn't, and given him permission to torture the Grounder. Not once could Bellamy think of a time when Clarke had seemed to him like a kid.

A kid. Bellamy scoffed at himself. They were just kids, so why did it matter. He was a grown ass man, damn it, and as long as Clarke and the others could behave like adults – which they definitely could, if their performance against the Grounders was anything to go by – then it didn't matter how old they were. Bellamy rolled over, eyes closed and determined to give up this train of thought and get some sleep.

Maybe, though, he'd stop sleeping with the girls around camp. At least until they started turning eighteen.


	3. Chapter 3 (with a large AN)

**AN - Back, again. With many many problems. First, readers must understand that I am a one-shot writer, and not a very good one at that. What does that mean? That means I usually write with very little preparation, no plan, and I am absolute _rubbish_ at long plot lines. _But_ I really want this to work. **

**So, what does this mean? First. I have no idea where this story is going, but it will (hopefully) end somewhere with a happy Bellarke pairing. Second. This story will probably be under constant revision, as I try to fix my mistakes and flush out the plot. If I disappear for a while, and stop updating, hopefully it means that I am rewriting and finishing and will hopefully return with a half-decent completed story. Most likely it will mean that I've given up, so I'm apologizing in advance.**

**But, for the immediate fixes: **

****After speaking with a few of my reviewers, I realized that I really hadn't decided where in the timeline to put this. Chapter 2 mentions the Bellamy/Raven thing, but that was only a few (very crazy) days before the battle with the Grounders, which then lead to season 2, at which point it would be impossible for this story to happen because of season 2 things (no spoilers here!). This is a common problem for me, as I tend to see things as a whole picture sort of thing, and once I know what is going to happen, I can't just not know it. But, I tried to weed through the episodes and squeeze this into Season 1. It's not possible. There was some potential, to drop it between "Day Trip" and "I Am Become Death", or earlier with some tweaks, but it wasn't do-able without changing basically everything.****

**IF YOU'VE SKIPPED THE AN TO HERE, THIS PART IS IMPORTANT:**

**If you're just tuning in for the new chapter (3), and have already read chapters 1 and 2, then I need to give you some info. Chapters 1 and 2 have been... tinkered with. Here is the implied backstory which you need to know:**

**1) There is no season 2.**

**2) This story takes place after the battle with the Grounders.**

**3) The mountain men never came, Anya was released to the remaining Grounders, and there is a tentative peace agreement between the 100 and the Grounders**

**4) The 100 is currently re-building their camp, and preparing for winter**

**5) Mecha station never fell. What is going on aboard the Ark will probably never be important to this story, but for those who are curious I do have a story for them in mind, and will be happy to share it if asked.**

**Thanks for your time. Please review. I'm not sure where this is going, but hopefully it winds up somewhere good.**

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><p>Excitement was running high tonight, as the remaining members of the 100 basked in the groundbreaking of their first permanent building. The new food store was barely begun, and needed at least another three days of continuous labor to complete, but it was a definite step towards making their temporary camp into an established colony.<p>

And, not as important but of much more interest, it was Nathan Miller's birthday.

"I now present to you, 'The Miller'!" Monty held up his newest cask of moonshine to cheers from the surrounding crowd. He was standing on the tall table which doubled as a workbench, his footing precarious between a pile of homemade tools and a stack of cut wood. Jasper moved through the group with another jug, filling cups and water bags as he went. "I dedicate 'The Miller' to the actual Nathan Miller, whose long awaited seventeenth birthday we celebrate today. You're a great man, Miller. May this liquor we drink in your name be just a good."

Monty raised his glass in Miller's direction, the birthday toast echoing around the camp.

"Oh, God." Clarke grimaced over her crude cup, "That is awful." Beside her Bellamy chuckled low, but any smart remark might have made was lost behind his own poorly masked splutter.

"Jesus."He muttered under his breath. One of the younger kids walked past, a boy Clarke recognized from Finn's tracking lessons, and Bellamy thrust his cup at him. "Here Jaime, enjoy." Clarke watched the kid scamper off, excited, before turning to Bellamy with one eyebrow cocked.

"What?" He asked. "I've got patrol soon." The way he looked at her, like his staying sober was the most obvious thing in the world, made Clarke laugh even as she agreed with him, albeit sarcastically. Bellamy shook his head, but his lips pulled into a smile. "Finish your drink, Princess." Clarke rolled her eyes, but cringed down another swallow of the bitter liquid now coined 'The Miller'.

"Clark?" Bellamy began, after a few minutes of companionable silence. His eyes didn't leave the party around them, but he leaned a little closer to Clarke as he spoke, "Did you know that Miller was sixteen?"

Clark shrugged. "I never really thought about it." She said. "Why?"

He didn't answer at first, and Clarke saw his head turn in the direction of the birthday boy. Miller was propped up on the shoulders of two shooters, gesturing wildly in what appeared to be a rather rambunctious speech. A splash of liquor fell from his cup, landing to loud complaints in the hair of a few revelers.

Bellamy's shoulders were tense. "Nothing. Never mind."

Miller's group was pulled into a large circle of kids around the main table, where Monty and Jasper were putting together a drinking game involving everyone's cups and a handful of hard berries.

Beside her Bellamy didn't move, but Clarke could see a tightness in his jaw that she was coming to recognize as his angry-at-himself face. Bellamy made that face a lot these days, usually when he was fighting with Octavia, or – almost as often – when he was reminded of the kids they'd lost to the Grounder battle. "You know Miller's dad is a commander in the Guard?" She asked conversationally when the look didn't show any sign of going away on its own. Bellamy turned to her.

"Commander Miller? That Miller?"

Clarke nodded. "Yeah. His dad started training him for the Guard when he was really young. I heard he was on the short list for early recruitment, too."

"I met the Commander a few times, he seemed like a good man." Bellamy looked back. "So why'd Miller get arrested?"

"Someone broke into their apartment while his dad was on duty. Finn said that the guy attacked Miller's mom. He was arrested for defending her."

Miller raised both arms in a cheer. Apparently he'd just won Jasper's drinking game. "He's a good guy." Bellamy said. Clarke nodded.

"So are you." She said. "That's why Miller looks up to you." Clarke put her hand on Bellamy's arm, drawing his attention to meet her eyes. Even though he was a good few inches taller than her, the uncertainty hiding behind his eyes made Clarke feel, for a second, like they stood even. "Even if Miller hadn't been arrested, by now he'd still be doing what he's doing here, as part of the Guard. Following you isn't making him grow up too fast, or turning him into a bad person, Bellamy. You're giving him a purpose."

Bellamy's eyes flicked back and forth between hers. He didn't say anything, but Clarke could see that his shoulders had relaxed a little.

"Clarke!" Octavia called from the group, before either could speak again. "Come play next round!"

Clarke hesitated. "Go ahead, Princess." Bellamy said, returning her smile with his own crooked grin. He knocked his head in the direction of the party. "Go have fun."

The feel of Bellamy's gaze on her back followed her until Clarke reached the table. When she looked back, her eyes met his for a moment, and then it was her turn to watch his back while he relieved Craig at the gate.

"Clarke, it's your turn."


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: I'm back. This is part 1 of what is really a longer chapter, but I'm not quite done with the second half. Chapter 5 will be posted on Nov 16th, in 2 days. Until then!**

**-Brea**

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><p>"You know that old expression, 'stop and smell the roses'?" Bellamy didn't answer; he knew that she knew that yes, he was aware of the expression. "After eighteen years, this is the first time I've ever seen real roses."<p>

She just stood there, not moving. Bellamy eyed the line of wild rose bushes growing alongside the road. Eighteen years wasn't such a big deal, not considering that there was a whole generation – their grandparent's generation – that had been born, lived and eventually died aboard the Ark. He wouldn't say so, though, because Bellamy had to admit that he still felt a jolt in his own heart anytime he saw something new on Earth, something he'd only read about before the 100.

"God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December." He recited, voice low.

Clarke didn't look back. "Who said that?"

"James Barrie." Bellamy answered. "He wrote Peter Pan."

"Hm." She sniffled a little, and Bellamy wondered if she was crying. "I guess you could say God gave us digital recording for the same reason, huh?"

He laughed. "Yeah, I guess so." Crossing the few steps between them, Bellamy came up beside her in front of a large bush. It was dotted with pink roses, still in full bloom despite the cooling weather. In a few more weeks, this whole area would be void of color, and probably covered in snow if weather patterns were still predictable. "Well, Princess. Are you going to smell them or not? We haven't got all day." Bellamy prodded her forward with a bump of his shoulder against hers.

Clark took one small step towards the flowers, then another, until she was close enough to reach out and touch the topmost bloom. Her fingers drifted over the top of the rose, feeling the tips of each petal individually. Rotating her wrist, she let her hand drop around to cup the rose from beneath, wrapping the stem between her index and middle fingers. Slowly she leaned forward, pulling the rose closer, and Bellamy imagined her eyes closing. A full minute passed in silence.

"So? How is it?"

"It's… sweet." Clark called back. She didn't move from her place, but her hand moved to feel a few of the nearby blooms. "And sort of musky at the same time." She laughed. "Does that make sense?"

Bellamy was going to say no, because 'sweet and musky' in the same sentence didn't actually make any sense at all, but then Clarke craned her head over one shoulder and he saw her face. Her eyes were shining, whether with happiness or actual tears he wasn't sure, and she was wearing the largest grin he'd seen from her since… ever, really. So instead of making a joke at her expense, like he'd intended, Bellamy let his lips turn up into a smile.

"Sure, Princess. I guess that makes sense."


	5. Chapter 5

**AN - Chapter 5 here, and with 40 minutes until it's (technically) late. I could have gone longer, but I've been working on this for a while to get every line right and if I kept going it would be late. So hope you enjoy! Also, if you haven't seen my new story "101 Ways to Say I Love You", please check it out. Updates on that are about every day right now. Review!**

**Love always - Brea**

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><p>Clarke Griffin was a whirlwind, blowing through camp with only one mission: to find Bellamy Blake. She marched up to the flap of his tent, one of the last standing since most people had moved into the rough cabins by now. Miller was sitting on a log outside, rifle slung behind his back, and Clarke made a mental note to remind Bellamy that guns were for guarding the wall and patrols, not for guarding his tent. The reminder could wait though.<p>

"Hey Miller. Is he in? I really need to talk to him."

Miller shrugged. "Sorry, Clarke. Bellamy said he doesn't want to be bothered."

"Bellamy never wants to be bothered, Miller. Just tell him it's me."

"I can't, Clarke." He said. "I'm not supposed to let anybody in, not even you. That's the order."

Clarke's fingers clutched the rough bag she held, fashioned from a scrap of parachute, a little tighter. It had been a long time since Bellamy had refused her entrance to his space. She'd actually gotten into the habit of coming by at least once a day, to compare notes with him on the goings on around camp and the rebuilding status. Being, well, locked out…Clarke wasn't sure how to take that.

Her mouth opened, but nothing came out, so she closed it again and swallowed.

Maybe she should go in anyways? She eyed Miller and the rifle. The boy was loyal to Bellamy; loyal enough to kill for him, to be sure. But Clarke seriously doubted that Bellamy would want Miller _shooting_ people to keep them out of his tent. The only danger in ignoring Bellamy's order was the sure-to-begin argument between she and him that would follow. Probably.

Well, that and the possibility of an eyeful of whatever Bellamy was doing that he didn't want interrupted.

Lips pursed, Clarke adopted the annoyed tone that had once been standard for her interactions with Bellamy Blake. "Fine." She said tersely. "Just tell him when he comes out that I was looking for him, okay?" Miller nodded.

There wasn't anything left to say, so with a short look at the tent flap – what _was_ he doing in there? – Clark left. She needed to speak to Monty anyways, about the contents of her little parachute bag.

"Clarke?"

She'd only moved a few feet when she heard Bellamy call out behind her. He was coming out of the tent now, shirtless, and rubbing the corner of one eye. His curls were mussed on one side, like he'd been in bed. Miller was dismissed with a nod.

"You alright? Come on in."

Clarke hesitated to follow and Bellamy, after a cursory questioning glance, smirked at her. "There's no one here, Clarke. Your eyes will be safe." When she still didn't move, he waved his hand at the tent. "Well you know where to find me." This time she followed him in.

Under the shade of the tent the air was cool, but without the crisp tang of the coming winter outside. The entire space smelled of him, a combination of sweat and pine that Clarke had come to associate entirely to Bellamy, and it gave her the sense that the air was warmer here. A pile of rumpled bedding was pushed to one side, spread across a waterproof tarp. It was, as promised, empty, though recently used.

"Napping?" She asked him. It was supposed to be sarcastic, but Clarke could feel the skin around her eyes crinkle, the tell of a real smile. Bellamy must have sensed the fondness in her joke, because he smiled back at her.

"It's been a long week, I figured you could handle the place for a while." Clarke tried not to watch the muscles in his back stretch when he reached for his shirt. She averted her eyes, absently wondering if the dark olive tone of his skin would fade over the winter, when the number of daylight hours was supposed to drop dramatically. "You got my gift then?" Bellamy nodded to the bag she still held. He looked at ease, leaned against his rough table, for once paying no attention to the shrunken-down model of camp he'd built over it.

"Rose buds." She said. The bag had been waiting for her in the drop ship after breakfast that morning. Several buds, at least a dozen covered in a light layer of mud, rolled around inside. The only roses anyone in camp had seen were a mile up the ridge, where she and Bellamy had stopped the day before on their way up the mountain

"Monty says if you plant them now, they'll bloom next spring. Happy birthday, Princess."


	6. Chapter 6

**AN- Hey y'all. I'm a day late, I know. This was supposed to go up last night, but then I had a sudden bout of miserable depression and spent the day curled up on the couch, wallowing in misery. So writing didn't happen. But I'm better today, and posting again. Next chapter should still be up tomorrow, as planned. So until then! -Brea**

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><p>"I still can't believe my brother gave you flowers."<p>

Clarke rolled her eyes. This was the third time Octavia had expressed her disbelief at the current situation.

"He didn't give me flowers, Octavia, he gave me rosebuds."

"Right." she said, "which grow into roses, which are flowers. I want to know why."

Clarke huffed. Giving up on the battle with her small hole in the ground, she sat back on her ankle. Clapping the dirt from her hands, she said "They're for my birthday, I guess."

"But your birthday was two weeks ago."

"Yeah, well." Clarke said. Her feet were going numb under her, so she shifted to sit cross legged, only realizing her mistake when the cold from the frozen ground seeped through the fabric of her pants. She hissed through her teeth in surprise. "Shit. Help me up." Octavia grabbed her extended hand and hefted her to a standing position.

"Apparently no one told him that my birthday was two weeks ago." Clarke said once she was standing, bent slightly to wipe her hands on the thighs of her jeans. " He figured it out yesterday when wewere talking and I told him I was eighteen." She picked up her make-shift shovel and they walked towards the tent they were using to store gear. It used to be Raven's tent, but the older girl had moved into a cabin the week before. It was a relief to Clarke to get the piles of hammers, axes, saws, and other "yard" tools out of the dropship, as having people passing in and out of her infirmary every time they wanted to chop wood.

"Okay." Octavia said, "But Roses?

Clarke shrugged. "We were up the ridge by the cabins, there are rose bushes up there."

"Huh." Octavia was fingering a half formed axe blade that someone was making with a shard of dropship rubble. The look on her face was pensive, considering. Clarke didn't want to know what Octavia might be thinking about Bellamy giving her a gift, because there was nothing to be thinking. Right?

Octavia replaced the axe and stood straight, thoughtful look gone. "Well it's too bad the ground's frozen. How many did you actually get planted?" The girls exited the tent, making their way now towards the fire pit and the smell of roasted hog for lunch.

"Only four." Clarke said. "If it warms up this afternoon I'll try again. If not, maybe it will be warmer tomorrow."

It wasn't warmer the next day. In fact, when Clarke left the dropship bundled in every article of Earth-made and home-made clothing she had, she was shocked to see a fine dusting of white powder over the camp. Snow, she realized. Her fingers trailed through the mounds of ice on tables.

Had anyone else seen this?


	7. Chapter 7

**AN - Posting this right after midnight, as I'm settling in to watch Season 2 Episode 5 on Hulu - I've been waiting for it to upload all night. So excited for the hug!**

**Chapter 7 is here! I think this is one of the longer chapters, which is still very short. I could have kept going, but I am very afraid of crossing the line between "conversation" and "useless, time-wasting dialog that accomplishes nothing."**

**If you are looking for a good read, check out "Uneven" by Avari20. It is the fic I wish I could write, and includes the issues with Bellamy's age that inspired "Eighteen". Avari20 doesn't know I'm plugging her fic, so I hope she doesn't mind. But seriously, read it. Pretend "Eighteen" is half that good. Thanks. :)**

**Enjoy!**

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><p>Bellamy woke up cold.<p>

Actually, he'd woken up cold the last four mornings in a row (which had prompted him to start sleeping in a shirt), but today was colder. He laced his boots and grabbed his jacket, zipping it to his neck, before leaving the tent.

The ground was… white. A few flakes of ice, what would turn out to be the last of the day, fell through the air in front of him. Snow. It had been snowing. Winter was here. Bellamy stopped outside his door and looked around.

The sight was beautiful, a thousand times better than the digital pictures and films from his Earth Skills classes back on the Ark.

It was also terrifying.

With the official start to winter, Bellamy knew they were close to running out of time to prepare. Soon all of the edible plants in the region would stop producing, animals would go into hibernation, and the lake where they fished would freeze. Cold and starvation were about to replace the Grounders as the dominant threat to his people, and Bellamy wasn't sure they were ready for it. He hoped they were ready for it.

They'd have to double their efforts to gather supplies, and finish the cabins sooner than planned. He added those to his mental 'shit-to-do' list.

A thump came from the right, and Bellamy turned to see Miller jump from his post on the wall. He approached the younger man, meeting outside the dropship.

"All quiet last night, Bellamy."

"Good." Miller was a good second, Bellamy was glad to have chosen him. They two talked in hushed tones for a few minutes, going over the day's security plans and the progress of Miller's new protege, Craig. The kid was doing well, much to his chagrin. Not that it wasn't a good thing, because it was; having another capable gunner and guard in camp would benefit all of them. But Clarke had chosen Craig for the wall, against Bellamy's better judgement, and he wasn't looking forward to her pleased (she'd say pleased, he'd call it gloating) expression when she realized she'd been right.

"Get some rest, Nate. We'll talk later." Bellamy said once they'd finished. He clapped the boy on the shoulder, ushering him off to his tent.

Normally, after relieving the night guard, Bellamy would take up his usual position on the wall. Today though, with the sun just beginning to shine on the frozen ground around him and the chilled air seeping through his jacket, his eyes fell on the still burning but very small fire in the main pit. A few minutes later he had the fire roaring to it's usual size.

He heard Clarke leave the dropship before he saw her. She looked younger, eyes wide to take in the changed scenery around them. It was a sharp contrast to the fierce, too-serious look she usually carried. For once she actually looked her age.

Had he really forgotten that she was _only_ eighteen?

He was reminded of the conversation they'd had a few days before, about everyone in camp being young. At the time, they had seen eighteen as the age of majority, as it was on the Ark. Watching Clarke, though, Bellamy suddenly remembered what he, himself, was like at eighteen years old. Young, idealistic, preoccupied. While he'd been forced to grow up quickly to protect his sister, at eighteen even he had felt the invincibility and excitement of young adulthood, much like the teens that made up their little community.

Bellamy wondered if he, at eighteen, could have accomplished had the things Clarke had in their short time on Earth.

Probably not.

"So this is snow." Clarke said. She knocked some white powder off the log he sat on, settling next to him. "Somehow I imagined it less… frozen." Bellamy laughed at the distaste in her voice.

"The princess having a problem with the weather?" He joked. "Why am I not surprise."

Clarke grinned, a much different reaction than the one she would have had a month prior. Bellamy decided he liked her smile better than her ire, though the latter was enticing on it's own.

_Exciting_, he corrected to himself. _Fighting with Clarke is exciting because it's fun. Not enticing._

He noticed her hands were tucked up into her sleeves, and threw another log on the fire by her feet.


	8. Chapter 8 (freaking finally, amiright?)

**Hey, hi... Hello! I'm back! And rubbing my head sheepishly, I assure you. It has been a crap (and I say that only because any other adjectives I could use are much more inappropriate in polite conversation) couple of weeks. You can_not _even imagine.**

**But it's over now, and I'm out of school for a month (yay!) Before I go back to an even worse course load (which is all my fault. Boo!) In January. I'm way behind on my writing, so Eighteen probably won't be updated every other day like before, at least not for a while. Hopefully every week, at least. Also, I think the upcoming chapters are going to be way better, so if you've made it this far you should stick around.**

**Lastly, my story '101' _is _back to being updated every other day, and is also getting better. And I've written most of this chapter in Google Docs from my phone, I tried to find and remove all the errors, so I hope it's a smooth read.**

**I've never stopped loving you! -Brea**

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><p>If Clarke hadn't been where she normally wasn't, she probably never would have noticed anything different.<p>

It happened when she was walking the wall, checking in with the guards getting into position for night watch. Bellamy would be by in a while; she knew he always briefed the night's group before going to bed himself. But with the newly arrived chance of snow, Clarke wanted to make sure the kids knew how to properly keep warm. She didn't want to deal with hypothermia or frostbite in the morning, even minor cases, because some idiot hadn't managed to keep blood flowing in his fingers.

So there she was, passing out panther fur gloves and reminding kids to keep their feet moving, when she heard the other girls.

It was Teya and Monroe, the latter loading her gun for the night while the former spoke. Clarke didn't mean to listen but the first words out of Teya's mouth caught her attention.

"Something's up with Bellamy."

Clarke gave Craig a blanket, then pretended to count the others in her hand, tuning an ear to the girls' conversation.

Monroe scoffed. "Still saying no, then?"

"I don't get it." Teya said. Her voice carried a whine that Clarke found annoying, not unlike several of the girls back on Phoenix Station, whining when their parents refused extra credits to spend at the Exchange. It was the whine of someone spoiled, who expected certain things and was unaccustomed to being told no. "He just says 'not tonight', but he's said it every night this week!"

"Do you think he's sleeping with someone else?"

Clarke raised an eyebrow at the blankets. Teya shook her head emphatically. "I asked Monica and she hasn't been with him either. Nobody's seen him with anybody else." the girl threw her hands up, frustrated. "Unless he's sneaking around with someone…" Her voice trailed off. From the corner of her eye, Clarke saw Teya turn towards her and... was that a glare?

What? Did Teya actually think Bellamy was sleeping with her?

Before Clarke could decide whether or not to deny it, to Monroe laughed, echoing Clarke's thoughts out loud. "Trust me, T; if those two were getting together we'd all know it. He's probably just…"

Miller walked up with a rifle in his arms and an extra clip in his belt and Clarke was forced to abandon her eavesdropping. Together they reviewed the guard list, making sure everyone on watch for the night had been given Clarke's instructions and extra blankets. When Bellamy finally appeared a few minutes later, gun in hand and announcing that John, who'd had a runny nose for most of the afternoon, was relieved and that he himself would be covering the boy's shift, Clarke gave him a blanket and the same warnings she'd given Monroe, Miller and the others. He nodded along as as she spoke, though by the smirk on his face Clarke thought he might have already known them.

He may not be a tracker, or have excelled in Earth Skills the way Finn had, but Bellamy was surprisingly intuitive, something that served him just as well, if not more so, on the ground.

By the time they finished, having conducted a short version of their nightly debrief, the rest of the shooters had taken up residence on the wall. Even Monroe was in place in an alcove where the wall came close to the fire, Teya long gone. Clarke considered mentioning the girl's suspicion, or what she suspected Teya's suspicion might be, to Bellamy. If the idea of them sleeping together was common around camp, it could damage her credibility and authority among the Hundred. They'd have to address it, and end it, before it became an issue.

But Bellamy had already turned his back to her, making his way to John's assigned guard post. Plus, if she did bring it up, he would want to know where she'd heard such a thing. Which meant she'd have to tell him about the conversation she had overheard. Clarke felt herself blush in the dark at the idea, just imagining the awkward conversation where she admitted to knowing that he wasn't having sex.

She turned back to the dropship to put the rest of the blankets away until they were needed, shaking the blood from her cheeks. If she heard it again, she would say something. And anyways, odds were that Bellamy would hear it on his own long before it became a problem.


End file.
